April 1, 1995: I posed all day for the Alumni of OCA

Thirty years ago today 

            On Saturday I posed all day for the Alumni drawing session at the Ontario College of Art.

Robert Bentley

            On Sunday morning I continued to rework my translation of the fifth verse of “Le petit Lauriston” by Boris Vian. I was trying to figure out what “gidouille” means and found that it’s another made up word by Alfred Jarry from his absurdist play Roi Ubu. Apparently it’s a spiralling symbol on the enormous stomach of King Ubu to represent his enormous appetite. There are two lines left to revise. 

            I worked out the chords for about half of the final joint scat in “Sacha Distel et Jean-Pierre Cassel’s Song and Dance” by Serge Gainsbourg. 

            I played my Gibson electric guitar during song practice and it stayed in tune up until just before the last two songs. 

            I weighed 86.45 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I filled a lot of holes on the east and north walls of the bathroom. I also filled the gaps between the walls and the underside of the top shelves and top of the lower shelf, and where all the shelf brackets meet the shelves and the walls. I filled an enormous hole under the upper shelf on the north wall. Even if I never sand and paint it looks better now than before. I still have the area under the lower shelf to do, plus the inside of the bathroom door, the door frame, and a little bit of the southern wall. 

            I weighed 86.6 kilos before lunch. I had the usual tomatoes with avocadoes and lemon juice with a glass of Garden Cocktail. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride but it was misting heavy enough that if I’d gone all the way downtown I would have gotten wet. So I only went as far as Ossington and Bloor. 

            I weighed 86.8 kilos at 17:30, which is the heaviest I’ve been in the evening since March 19. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 18:30. 

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the studio recording of my song “Seven Shades of Blues” I imported all of the clips I’d gathered from “Lime Kiln Club Field Day” the first movie with an all black cast. I put them all at the end of the timeline and edited out the credits and the people talking about the movie. The one clip that Total Video Converter wouldn’t convert and that Cloud Covert did convert, just froze and so I deleted it. I have about 3.5 minutes of the movie now and I’ll try to edit it some more tomorrow. 

            I compared the videos of my acoustic song practice performances of “Sixteen Tons of Dogma” on September 6 and 9. On September 6 I look friendlier and I played the E flat chord a little better. I compared September 22 to September 6 and although on September 6 I play the E flat a little better, on September 22 I looked and played better in general. 

            I had a tomato, avocado, cucumber, and scallion salad with lemon juice and a glass of Garden Cocktail while watching episodes 23 and 24 of The Adventures of Batman. 

            In the first story, in the back room at Mother Appel’s Pies and Pastries, Simon the Pieman (who talks like WC Fields) is hosting a meeting with Joker, Penguin, Riddler, Catwoman, and Mr. Freeze. Simon flips a switch and they all fall through a trap door into an oubliette. His crime wave has five stages: Lady fingers, marble cake, graham crackers, pound cake and Napoleon. At the Gotham World’s Fair, in the House of Jewels the Wayne Diamonds are on display by beautiful models. During the show a giant pie with candles is delivered. A model named Cookie suggests to the designer that the candles be lit. This produces a blinding light so Batman and the cops are helpless, then Simon pops out of the pie and they steal the diamonds. When Barbara Gordon hears of the crime she changes to Batgirl and heads out on her Batgirl Cycle. She guesses that a Mother Appel truck might hold the crooks and follows it until she gets a pie in the face that causes her bike to crash. Then the Batmobile follows them to a carnival midway where Simon’s men are taken out with various game instruments like balls and mallets. The cook crooks get away but the diamonds are saved. Later Batman learns that Pieman has pulled off three more robberies at the fairgrounds. He’s stolen marble busts from the Greek Pavilion, cracked the safe at the Graham Trust Exhibit, and robbed 20,000 Pounds from the British Museum exhibit. The Bat Computer determines that Pieman might next go after the toll house receipts at the entrance gate or the painting of Napoleon at the French Pavilion. Batman and Robin split up to stake out both possibilities. At the museum, Robin sees Mother Appel plotting to take the painting but she sees him and reveals herself to be Simon the Pieman. This is the first cross dressing Batman villain and he’s never appeared in a Batman comic. She knocks Robin out with gas from her rolling pin. Robin is placed under the grindstone of a windmill. When the wind comes up he will be crushed. The wind begins and the stone starts to turn. Appel is now Simon again and he doesn’t allow any of his cronies to follow an order until he says “Simon says”. Meanwhile Batman is caught in a traffic jam. Robin manages to reach him with his utility belt radio. Batman calls for Alfred who arrives above in the Bat Copter. Batman climbs up and then Alfred climbs down to wait in traffic. Since there is a fair going on there must be lots of people in that traffic jam with cameras. If they saw the Batmobile they would want to photograph it and then would get pictures of Alfred in the Batmobile. Some of those pictures would have to get published and someone who knows Bruce Wayne and his butler would logically put two and two together and figure out Batman’s secret. Batman arrives to save Robin in the nick of time. They head upstairs to nap Simon but it turns out that the windmill blades are actually the propeller of a craft that takes off. The Bat Copter follows but the crooks dump flour out as a screen and they escape. back at Simon’s hideout he discovers that his men have captured Batgirl. She is put in the chocolate tank and chocolate syrup begins to pour in. Far at the top of the tank is a small air vent. Batgirl releases luminous powder that rises up through the vent and is noticed by Batman and Robin as they fly over. They land on the roof to investigate and Batman goes inside what seems to be a deserted dessert factory. He falls into a giant vat of batter. Robin enters and falls into a vat of butter. Simon turns on the heat to melt the butter and powers the mixer to blend the batter. Simon and Cookie dance the Cakewalk. Batman jams the mixer mechanism with a thrown Bat Hook, then he swings out. He frees Robin who tells him they have Batgirl in the chocolate tank but how would he know that? On emptying Batgirl’s prison, Batman sprays the chocolate through a hose at Simon and Cookie. The final fight begins. Robin frees Bat Girl and she joins in. The heroes throw a lot of pies into crooks’ faces. Batman sends them all down into the same oubliette where his main villains are being held. 

            In the second story, at the annual dinner of the Gotham Antique Society, the entertainment is provided by Chapeau Fedora and his crew. He pulls several rabbits from his hat and they begin to steal the priceless silverware. Batman and Robin are called and arrive just as Chapeau, who is really the Mad Hatter, escapes in his Hatmobile (This version of the Hatter talks something like Mr. Magoo). Seeing the Batmobile behind him the Hatter releases a lot of his trained rabbits to successfully block the road and so the Hatter escapes. Later Batman figures correctly that Hatter is modeling his crimes after the tea party in Alice in Wonderland. Hatter’s next caper is to steal a rare tea pot. In the Gotham Gallery a rare Chinese tea pot is on display. Above on a balcony, Hatter pushes Humpty Dumpty over and it lands to break and emit tear gas. The gas mask wearing crooks steal the pot. Batman and Robin arrive just as Hatter is leaving. The Hatter shoots goo from his hat that sticks the heroes’ feet to the floor. They use their Bat torches to free themselves. They pursue the Hatmobile but this time their way is blocked by Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. Batman and Robin capture them and then take dirt samples from their shoes. Back at the Bat Cave the computer determines that there is only one locale with the same soil content. They head there in the Bat Copter and find a cave, which they investigate but fall down a trap door onto a revolving floor with walls studded with sword blades. Hatter speeds up the floor and the centrifugal force will pull them to the wall to be cut by the swords. Batman throws a Batarang with a rope that wraps around one of the swords with the other end at the hub of the turntable. It stops the wheel from turning. Batman and Robin escape and then easily capture Hatter and his gang. I felt very sleepy after dinner and decided to go to bed for a while. I think I slept for about an hour. 

            Some of the animation for these two Batman episodes was done by Robert Bentley, who started in 1929 as an assistant animator at the Van Beuren Animation Studio in New York. Later he worked for Les Elton on Simon the Monk. Then he became a full fledged animator of Porky Pig for Warner Brothers. He then worked on Gulliver’s Travels for Fleisher Studios. In the early 1940s he animated Andy Panda and Woody Woodpecker for Walter Lantz. In the 50s he worked at Hanna Barbera. In the 60s and 70s he worked for Filmation on Star Trek and Spiderman.

March 31, 1995: I posed for a drawing group where I didn't feel welcome

Thirty years ago today 

            On Friday I posed at the Ontario College of Art. In the evening I worked for Paul and Sarah’s drawing session. I was late and it was a weird night. I didn’t feel welcome or comfortable.

Bob Carr

            On Saturday morning I finished revising my translation of the fourth verse of “Le petit Lauriston” by Boris Vian. There’s just one verse left and so I should have it done on Sunday. 

            I worked out the chords for Cassel’s tap dance music and his scat in “Sacha Distel et Jean-Pierre Cassel’s Song and Dance” by Serge Gainsbourg. All that’s left is the simple final scat by Distel and Cassel together and I should have that done tomorrow. 

            I played my Martin acoustic guitar for the last of two sessions. Tomorrow I’ll begin a four session stretch of playing my electric guitars. 

            I weighed 86.35 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I went to Freedom Mobile to pay for my April phone plan. From there I went to No Frills where I bought five bags of green grapes, two packs of raspberries, bananas, four bags of avocadoes, fifteen vine ripened tomatoes, mouthwash, lemon dish detergent, two jugs of orange juice, and two jugs of Garden Cocktail. I had the feeling I was forgetting something but couldn’t remember what. Walking down every aisle usually helps fix that but this time I didn’t bother. When I got home I realized it was vinegar for cleaning my humidifier that I’d forgotten. I don’t need it until Tuesday and so I’ll pick it up from Freshco on Monday. 

            When I left the supermarket my brakes were squealing and grinding very loudly. After I hauled my trailer upstairs I took my bike over to Metro Cycle. Gordon said disk brakes do that when they get wet and one just has to shake the water out by riding the bike and slamming the brakes a few times. He took my bike for a spin and shook the squeaks out. 

            I weighed 85.9 kilos at 14:30. I took a late siesta at 15:30 and woke up at around 17:15. It was too late to take a bike ride and it was raining anyway. 

            I weighed 86 kilos at 17:45. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 18:48. 

            I downloaded all of the video clips I could find of the 1913 film Lime Kiln Club Field Day, which was the first movie ever made with an all black cast. 4K Downloader downloads everything in MP4, which won’t work in Movie Maker and so I used Total Video Converter to convert all but one to WMV. It rejected that one file as did my WinX converter but Cloud Convert online did the job. 

            I reviewed the song practice videos of my performances of “Sixteen Tons of Dogma” on October 14 and 15. On October 14 I played it on my Martin acoustic guitar and the take at 31:30 wasn’t bad. On October 15 I played it on my Kramer electric guitar and the take at 8:15 in part B wasn’t bad but the E flat seemed off. I now have eleven acoustic and nine electric takes of the song to compare and to decide which was the best of each. 

            I had a tomato, avocado, cucumber and scallion salad with lemon juice and a glass of Garden Cocktail while watching episodes 21 and 22 of The Adventures of Batman. 

            In the first story, a young stowaway on a freighter arriving in Gotham City is, except for his blond hair, a dead ringer for Dick Grayson. When the crew see him he jumps ship and swims to shore. On the docks he sees the Catwoman being chased by cops but doesn’t recognize her or them. All he knows is that a woman is in trouble and so he throws a knife to drop a net on the cops. Then the ship’s crew grab him, Catwoman decides to return the favour as she sends her men to take out the sailors. She learns that he has amnesia and then notices that he looks identical to Robin so she takes him on as a protegee (If she recognizes this boy as looking like Robin without a mask, why hasn’t she ever done the same with Dick Grayson?). She dyes his hair, dresses him as Robin and begins training him until she’s sure he can fight like Robin. Because she saved him he’ll do anything she asks. She plans to replace Batman’s Robin with her Robin. Catwoman stages a robbery to attract Batman and Robin to the scene. She lures Robin apart from Batman where he is pulled into the back of a van and knocked out. The van is driven away while the fake Robin pretends to be unconscious on the street. When Batman finds him he says he was hit from behind. Catwoman drives the van towards a construction pit and jumps out at the last minute, sending the van with Robin in it crashing below. The fake Robin pretends to faint and so Batman takes him home where he is put to bed and cared for by Alfred. Meanwhile the real Robin is inside the van that is buried in rubble. He manages to push open the back doors only to have more rubble rush into the van. The fake Robin pretends to have amnesia and asks Alfred to show him the way to the Bat Cave. When Batman sees him in the Bat Cave he orders him back to bed while Batman goes after Catwoman solo and thwarts her robbery of a fashion house. Meanwhile Robin continues to try to dig his way out. The fake Robin tries to call Catwoman to tell her Batman’s secret but Alfred stops him. He says the real Dick would not disobey an order. The fake Robin steals the Bat Copter and awkwardly flies it to try and reach Catwoman. Meanwhile the real Robin finally reaches the surface and makes his way to the Batcave. He takes a mini helicopter after the Bat Copter. The Bat Copter crashes and the real Robin confronts the fake one. They fight but the real Robin is weak from digging. Catwoman arrives and the fake Robin runs to her to tell her Batman’s secret but one of Catwoman’s men thinks he’s the real Robin and throws a rock that hits him in the head. The real Robin reunites with Batman. When the fake Robin regains consciousness he remembers that his real name is Christopher Collins and that he ran away from home to seek adventure. But now he doesn’t remember anything that has occurred since before he met Catwoman and so he’s forgotten Batman’s secret. 

            In the second story, the Maharaja of Taipoor is about to land at Gotham airport. When the Maharaja’s plane lands, a jeep drives in front of it with a sign on the back reading “Follow Me”. The plane taxis after the jeep to a remote part of the runway. As soon as the Maharaja emerges from the plane he is abducted and transferred to Mr. Freeze’s black plane. The Maharaja thinks they are shooting a gangster movie and is enjoying being part of it. Batman and Robin take to the air in the Batplane but they are looking for a black plane. Freeze covers his plane in frost until it turns white, then doubles back to Gotham airport. Freeze’s plane lands and the Maharaja is transferred to a limo. The limo drives into the back of a frozen food truck. Batman and Robin see the truck from the Bat Copter and Batman is lowered to the ground in a small Batcar to go after it. Freeze ices the road behind the truck, causing Batman difficulties. Then freeze turns the fog bank solid so Batman has to eject before the Batcar crashes into it. The ladder from the Batcopter is still there and he returns above. The truck goes to Freeze’s hideout at the old ice house. Freeze encases the Maharaja in ice. Batman and Robin descend to the roof on the ladder. They take out Freeze’s men easily and Freeze’s cold gun has no effect because they have the thermal power turned up on their utility belts. Freeze is arrested. The whole reason for all of this was for Freeze to get the Maharaja’s crown jewels but the Maharaja reveals he never goes out wearing his real jewels. 

            Some of the animation for these episodes was done by Bob Carr, who got his BA from the California Institute of the Arts. After graduation he became an assistant animator at Walt Disney. After that he worked freelance, animating for Hanna Barbera, Filmation, and Ralph Bakshi. He also did book illustrations for McGraw Hill. For Filmation he worked on Superman, Batman, Super Friends, and Scooby Doo. For Hanna Barbera he worked on Huckleberry Hound, Yogi Bear, The Flintstones, Quick Draw McGraw, The Harlem Globetrotters and Space Ghost. For Bakshi he worked on American Pop.

March 30, 1995: The open stage at The Cactus was canceled

Thirty years ago today

            On Thursday the open stage at the Cactus Club was cancelled.

Lenn Redman

            On Friday morning I went to bed at 2:15 because I wanted to get caught up on my journal as I’d fallen asleep again earlier on Thursday night. I wanted to do some work filling holes in the bathroom wall today and so I sacrificed some sleep so I wouldn’t be catching up on my journal during my renovation project period between breakfast and lunch. 

            I continued to rework my translation of the fourth verse of “Le petit Lauriston” by Boris Vian. I was trying to find out what “rastrons” means, and it seems to be another made up word by Alfred Jarry. As near as I can tell without extensively studying Jarry’s absurdist work, rastrons seem to be porkchop holders. 

            I worked out the chords for the antepenultimate scat segment and about half of the tap dance in “Sacha Distel et Jean-Pierre Cassel’s Song and Dance” by Serge Gainsbourg. 

            I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice for the first of two sessions. It continues to go out of tune but I can’t try to get it fixed until the heat goes off, and that won’t be for at least a few more days. 

            I weighed 86.35 before breakfast. 

            Around midday I removed my bathroom mirror from the wall. It didn’t come off as clean as I’d hoped since one of the adhesive Velcro strips came off with it. I filled the holes on the eastern wall behind and around where the mirror goes. I covered the big hole that I used to hang the mirror from, but I’ll have to cover it again because it’s now an indent. I left the mirror off for a few hours until the compound was dry. I had to use a new adhesive Velcro strip for the top of the mirror before remounting it. I’ll have to remove it again when I sand and so I might lose more strips and have to buy a new pack. 

            I forgot to buy tomatoes yesterday so before lunch I walked over to Queen Fresh and got three vine tomatoes. 

            I weighed 86.05 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride but only made it to Brunswick and Bloor before it started raining and so I headed south to Harbord, west to Ossington, south to Queen, and home. It was a first real rain I’ve driven through with the new fenders. I got wet but my ass didn’t. 

            I weighed 85.9 kilos at 18:38. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 19:38. 

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the studio recording of my song “Seven Shades of Blues” I added the clips I made from the movie Wings of Desire to the main timeline. To correspond with my line “Man wants to be the angel that desires to be a man” I added clips of the trapeze artist wearing angel wings followed by the angel with his wings fading away. The next line of the song is “Freedom marries slavery and their child transcends them both”. I looked for the earliest movies featuring black people and found the very first film with an all black cast. It's a 1913 silent picture called Lime Kiln Club Field Day. I found clips from the movie and I also found the whole film but that file has a Museum of Modern Art watermark for most of it. I think that I can harvest what I need from some of these files. 

            I had a tomato, avocado, cucumber, and scallion salad with lemon juice and a glass of Garden Cocktail while watching episodes 19 and 20 of The Adventures of Batman. 

            In the first story, in Gotham Park a replica of a small French castle has been erected to house an exhibit of the crown jewels of Charlemagne. The alarm system is so state of the art that it would be impossible for a thief to break in. So Catwoman has decided to steal the whole castle. She uses three helicopters to grapple and then carry it away. Four would make more sense since it’s a four cornered object. She just happens to have a mountain hideout with a crater into which the castle can be lowered and then a false mountain peak is placed on top as camouflage. When Batman investigates the theft he finds a note from Catwoman saying she’ll deal with the highest bidder. Robin alerts all of Batman’s underworld contacts that Bruce Wayne wants to bid for the jewels. Meanwhile Joker is jealous of Catwoman’s ingenious crime and plots to steal the jewels from her. That night at Wayne Manor Catwoman sneaks into Bruce’s library for her scheduled appointment with him. He offers her $1 million for the jewels and gives her a $100,000 down payment. But the cash contains a homing device so Batman can track her. Later Joker blocks Catwoman’s way on the road and asks her to take him in as a partner. She flatly turns him down but he only really stopped her to plant a homing device in her vehicle. He arrives outside of her hideout shortly before the Batmobile gets there. The Joker uses trained mice to carry a message to Catwoman to warn her about Batman. She readies an ambush for Batman and Robin but while she’s dealing with them the Joker is stealing the stolen jewels with the help of his trained mice. Catwoman causes a cave-in to trap the heroes. When she discovers the jewels gone she knows it was the Joker so she has her pet cheetah track his mice while she follows from above in her Cat Copter. Batman and Robin free themselves with explosives from their utility belts. Cheetah finds Joker’s car and Catwoman descends on it, clamping and lifting it. She flies it to a river where she begins dunking it until Joker agrees to give her back the jewels. Finally Joker gives in and she lowers him a ladder. Batman and Robin arrive below and use their Batapults to hurl themselves towards the Cat Copter. They catch hold and climb inside. It doesn’t show how Batman beats Catwoman but in the next scene the helicopters are taking the castle back to Gotham Park with the jewels inside. There is no explanation as to how the castle came out of the explosion intact. 

            In the second story, a ritzy rooftop charity bazaar takes place in which dolls are the prizes. Suddenly a police doll comes to life, grabs the generous donation box and drops it off the roof where it is caught in a net extending from a van that drives away. Batman is summoned with the Bat signal and Commissioner Gordon shows him the police doll, telling him that Doll Man is back in action. This is the first time this cartoon series invented a Batman villain. Up until now they’ve used comic book established adversaries. Dollman sends his banker doll for his next caper. It climbs into a bank’s night deposit box and then unlocks the door from inside to let two more dolls in. The dolls are preparing to blow open the vault when Batman throws a baterang to knock the explosive away. The dolls put up a fight but they are defeated easily. The Dollman gets away in his van. The next day at the Gotham Museum Gordon shows Batman and Robin the three penny blue stamp that’s worth a million. That night Dollman’s postman doll is already inside the museum in a display case. It steals the stamp and is leaving when it is stopped by a suit of armour with Batman inside. The postman throws a grenade that briefly stuns Batman but Robin catches the doll. Later Dollman plants two Batman and Robin dolls in the glove compartment of the Batmobile when it’s parked outside of police headquarters. When the heroes are driving, suddenly the compartment flips open and the dolls fire darts, but the heroes eject from the car just in time. Batman programs the dolls to return to Dollman and Batman and Robin follow. Dollman sends his whole doll army after the heroes but they defeat it easily. Dollman explodes but he’s just another doll controlled by Dollman who is caught. 

            Some of the animation for these episodes was done by Lenn Redman, who was a caricaturist at the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair. He was also a caricaturist on the You Asked For It variety show. In his career he created more than 100,000 caricatures. He was an animator of early Porky Pig and Oswald Rabbit cartoons. He drew the Mary Worth comic strip for the Chicago Tribune. He was an animator for the Sorcerer’s Apprentice segment of Fantasia, The Archie Show, Aquaman, Superman and The Cosby Kids. He wrote How To Draw Caricatures. He created the socially activist “What Am I?” poem and illustrated book series. He taught cartooning at the Lenn Redman Commercial Art Studio.

March 29, 1995: I spent the day writing and then performed at Fat Albert's

Thirty years ago today

            On Wednesday there was no work and so I probably spent the day writing before heading downtown to perform on the Fat Albert’s open stage.

Ann Guenther

            On Thursday morning I continued working on my translation of the fourth verse of “Le petit Lauriston” by Boris Vian. In trying to find out what he meant by “Une Chandelleu Verteu” (a green candle) I discovered that it’s a reference to Alfred Jarry’s absurdist play Ubu Roi. The light from his green candle is the light of what he calls pataphysics, the light of the science of exceptions, or the light of the science of imaginary solutions, or light on the fact that every event in the universe is extraordinary. In later life Jarry began behaving more and more like the characters in his plays and often used the oath, “By my green candlestick!” At least once he painted his face green and rode through Paris on his bicycle in praise of absinth. He used a revolver to take target practice and when a neighbour complained that her children might be killed he reassured her that if they were he would help her make new ones. 

            I worked out the chords for all but the last line of the final verse of “Sacha Distel et Jean-Pierre Cassel’s Song and Dance” by Serge Gainsbourg. All that’s left are the scat parts, which I might work out tomorrow. 

            I played my Kramer electric guitar during song practice and it stayed in tune most of the time. Tomorrow I begin a two session stretch of playing my Martin acoustic guitar, which will go out of tune a lot. I’m hoping in another week or so the heat will go off and it will be humid outside and inside so I can carry my guitar to a luthier who can fix it. 

            I weighed 86.25 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I worked a little more on editing a video of the third appearance of Batgirl on the Batman TV series. 

            I weighed 86.85 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and on the way back I stopped at Freshco. I bought six bags of red grapes, two packs of raspberries, three bags of avocadoes, three individual avocadoes, bananas, and a bunch of scallions. 

            I weighed 86.5 kilos at 18:45. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 20:00. 

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the studio recording of my song Seven Shades of Blues I edited out most of the clips of the trapeze artist. I only kept the parts when she is horizontal on the trapeze and swinging towards the viewer while wearing the angel wings. Some of the later parts froze while I was editing and so I had to restart a couple of times. 

            I had a tomato, avocado, cucumber, and scallion salad with lemon juice and a glass of Garden Cocktail while watching episodes 17 and 18 of The Adventures of Batman. 

            In the first story the world’s most impregnable bank vault is robbed during the 32 seconds every day that the security system is shut down to reset the combination. A dirigible inserts a tube into the wall and the money is sucked out. The Penguin is responsible. Batman says the crime is Penguin’s style but he must have had help with such precision planning. We see that he’s right when the Penguin enters a cave containing a super computer and its creator. The computer planned Penguin’s crime. Penguin pays the professor to let him use his inventions. His latest is an electromagnetic ray. Penguin asks the computer to plan a robbery utilizing the ray and including all of Batman’s likely counter measures. So Penguin uses the ray gun to lift an armoured car high in the air and shake the money and the guard out. The driver sends a distress message and Batman is called. They see the Penguin and ready their baterangs but the ray knocks them from their hands. Then Penguin starts to fly away in his upside down umbrella Robin uses the Batapult to shoot himself up to grab him but when he’s back on the ground they see it’s only a dummy. Meanwhile across town, Penguin is in his dirigible robbing a safe from a high rise office building. The Bat Computer determines that Penguin must be using a computer. The next day Penguin learns that Batman is bringing all his computer tapes and cards to police headquarters for a lecture. Penguin asks the professor’s computer what it could do with Batman’s computer records. The machine says there is nothing it couldn’t do. Penguin uses a smoke screen and infra red glasses to rob Batman’s computer records during the lecture. But the professor’s computer warns Penguin he’s been tricked by one of Batman’s microcircuit punch cards and tells him to switch to channel X. Penguin tells his computer to feed Batman information that leads him to the sulphur pits. Batman and Robin go to the sulphur pits and collapse from the fumes. But professor Billingsley rescues them for his own purposes and takes them back to his lab. He programs his computer with their brainwaves so it can predict every thought that enters their minds. Batman and Robin are released in the marsh without knowing what happened. Penguin sends hunters to shoot them down but Batman and Robin ambush two of them. Penguin’s computer anticipates the ambush. It knows the heroes now have a communicator and so different signals will be used. Meanwhile at Wayne Manor, Alfred is worried because his employer and friend has not returned. He decides to use the Bat Computer to find out what to do. Batman and Robin come across a crocodile nest and aren’t surprised to see crocodiles in America. Batman saves Robin by lodging a baterang in the croc’s mouth, then ropes it and suspends it by its tail. They are attacked by hunters but defeat them. Meanwhile Alfred learns that Batman has gone to the marshlands and so he heads there in the Bat Boat. Batman and Robin infiltrate the cave where Penguin is with the computer. But Billingley shoots them with his new paralyzing ray, then Penguin shoots them with it again and opens up a vat of acid in front of them. The computer says Batman’s secret identity is recorded in its memory bank. So Penguin asks “Who is Batman?” It says “Batman’s secret identity is B…B…B…I have been tricked with a self destruct card”. The computer is about to explode. Penguin escapes while Batman and Robin escort Billingsley free of the blast. Despite the loss of his life’s work the professor thinks Batman’s trick of planting the self destruct card for Penguin to steal was brilliant. From the Bat Copter they see that Alfred has captured Penguin. Nobody seems concerned that Billingsley sees Bruce Wayne’s butler working for Batman. 

            In the second story, at the annual Halloween ball a valuable painting is to be auctioned for charity. Commissioner Gordon is officiating while wearing a Scarecrow costume. Gordon is called away to a phone call but Batgirl follows him and sees him being attacked. She manages to kick one of the thugs but is gassed and captured by the real Scarecrow. I was beginning to think that this series was only going to use Joker, Penguin, Riddler, Catwoman, and Freeze or combinations of those for the whole series but after 18 episodes they’ve brought in Scarecrow. His men kidnap Batgirl while Scarecrow pretends to be Gordon and steals the painting. Later we find that Scarecrow has taken Batgirl’s belt so she can’t call Batman. Scarecrow and his men rob the Farmers Market but Batman and Robin are waiting and take out his men. But Scarecrow knocks some crates down on the heroes and he and his crew escape. Batgirl is being held in the loft of a barn. She startles a hanging bat to make it fly and as her guards see the shadow of its wings she shouts “Get em Batman”. They are startled and fall from the loft. Batgirl runs from the barn and jumps onto a riding mower. They capture her again but it turns out she wasn’t trying to escape but wrote “SOS” in the grass. Batman and Robin see it from the Bat Copter. They land and enter the barn. Scarecrow is about to catch them in a net when Batgirl kicks over a bail of hay and they jump out of the way. There is a fight and even though Batgirl is tied up she joins in. She is untied and tries to help by giving Batman some eggs to throw but they are Scarecrow’s gas eggs and they are all knocked out. Batman and Batgirl are locked in a shed while Robin is tied to a conveyor belt moving towards a thresher. Batman uses junk that’s been stored in the shed to make a makeshift crossbow and arrow on a rope, which he shoots and jams the thresher. The machinery pulling back on the rope tears the door off the shed and they escape. They take out Scarecrow’s men. Scarecrow tries to escape in a balloon but Batman throws a pitchfork and pierces the balloon, causing it to plummet into the trees where Scarecrow is dangling like a scarecrow. 

            Some of the backgrounds were done by Anne Guenther, who was only the second woman in ten years to work as a background artist at Disney when she started her career in 1956 as an inker on Sleeping Beauty. She worked on the Fresh Up Freddie 7-Up commercials. She worked for Hanna-Barbera and Filmation. Her first TV work was on the Fantastic Four animated series. In the 70s she worked for Disney again. She did backgrounds for Robin Hood in 1973, then Winnie the Pooh and the Mad Tiger, and The Adventures of Bernard and Bianca. She was a voting member of the Academy.

March 28, 1995: As usual on a Tuesday I hosted my open stage

Thirty years ago today

            On Tuesday night as usual I hosted my Orgasmic Alphabet Orgy writers open stage in the Art Bar of the Gladstone Hotel.

Venetia Epler

            On Wednesday morning I reworked my translation of the third and some of the fourth verse of “Le petit Lauriston” by Boris Vian. 

            I worked out the chords for all but the last line of the final verse of “Sacha Distel et Jean-Pierre Cassel’s Song and Dance” by Serge Gainsbourg. It’s not just the chords but also the correct French text that I have to find because Cy Strom didn’t give me a fully accurate transcription. I should have the last line worked out tomorrow and maybe some of the final scat parts. 

            I played my Gibson Les Paul Studio electric guitar during song practice. My foot switch’s battery is low and before it goes totally down for some reason it causes the reverb to get really loud. So I had to avoid using the reverb during the session. I started recharging it when I was done. 

            I weighed 85.85 kilos before breakfast, which is the lightest I’ve been in the morning since March 8. 

            Around midday I took my bathroom mirror over to the hardware store to find a better solution for hanging it than screwing a drywall anchor through the ring at the top. The guy showed me several options that would require screws but then he showed me picture hanging strips that are adhesive on one side and Velcro on the other that will hold five kilos, so I bought a package of eight. The instructions said to put four strips on the back of the thing being hanged, so I put them in four opposite places on the back of the round frame. Then I put one on the wall to correspond with the top strip and one for the bottom. When I pressed the mirror to them they clicked in place and felt very solid so I didn’t use the other two for the wall. It can be pulled off and reattached again when I fill the holes, when I sand, and when I paint, so I consider finding that solution a successful day. 

            I weighed 85.9 kilos before lunch, the same as on March 8. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. 

            I weighed 85.95 kilos at 18:18. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 19:26. 

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the studio recording of my song “Seven Shades of Blues” I still couldn’t play the last 36 minutes of Wings of Desire without it immediately freezing. So I opened up a blank project and copied Wings of Desire there. It froze every few minutes but I kept closing and opening another blank project each time until I’d seen it all. There was nothing more I needed from that movie for my project but it was great to see it again. It’s one of my favourite films. I opened the Seven Shades of Blues project and just deleted the end part. The rest of the project doesn’t freeze so far so next time I’ll edit the clips I saved from Wings of Desire and insert them into the main timeline to fit with my line, “Man wants to be the angel that desires to be a man”. 

            I had a tomato, avocado, cucumber and scallion salad with lemon juice and a glass of Garden Cocktail while watching episodes 15 and 16 of The Adventures of Batman. 

            The first story begins with Bruce Wayne showing Dick Grayson a painting and telling him it’s a faithful rendering of the Trojan Horse. It’s an amazing trick to do a “faithful rendering” of something that no one has ever seen. I guess it’s faithful in the sense that one must take the rendering on faith. A life sized replica is being delivered to the Wayne Foundation but Bruce is worried about theft and so he decides that it should be guarded by Batman and Robin. Later the replica is arriving in Gotham Harbour on a freighter. Penguin is above, shooting umbrellas that dig into the horse. That’s just stupid. Why put dents in something you are stealing because of its value? Each umbrella opens and becomes a rocket that lifts the horse into the air. But Batman and Robin emerge from inside the horse on helicopter chairs. They snag the horse with bat ropes and pull it back down to the ship. Riddler leaves a message for Batman with Commissioner Gordon: It’s the first line of the song “Mairzy Doates” by Milton Drake, then Riddler adds, “Everyone knows a horse eats oats and where it’s stashed is jivey”. Batman and Robin find Riddler in the grain elevator where the horse is being hidden and from above turn on a faucet of grain to bury Riddler and his men. Penguin invites Batman and Robin to the Penguin’s Nest under a flag of truce. Penguin shows him his computer and that he has programmed all of Batman’s vital statistics together with those of all of his possible alter egos. A picture of Bruce Wayne appears on the screen. But Batman pushes a button on his utility belt and suddenly the picture turns to that of Commissioner Gordon, then Chief O’Hara, then the Joker and then Superman. Later Bruce gets an invitation to a birthday party for him and Batman since Bruce and Batman have the same birthday. If he doesn’t show up it will prove he’s Batman. I can’t see how that would prove anything. He could just ignore the invitation from a criminal. Also, how could anyone know Batman’s birthday? He wouldn’t have a birth certificate and he wouldn’t have told anybody his date of birth. The painting of the Trojan Horse slides sideways to reveal a different entrance to the Batcave and it’s a very long tunnel not going down from Wayne Manor but horizontally. Unless Wayne Manor is suddenly adjacent to a mountain that would be impossible. The narrator always says the Bat Cave is far beneath Wayne Manor. That’s why they use the Bat Poles to get there. The party is at Poke’s Pavilion in Gotham Park. The Riddler and the Penguin and their men are waiting at a table with a big cake in the middle. Bruce arrives and the Riddler’s men attack him. He fights them off easily, adding to the suspicion that he’s Batman. Penguin knocks Bruce out with Penguin gas. Then Batman and Robin arrive. Robin goes into action and beats both Riddler’s and Penguin’s men while Batman just stands there. Bruce suddenly jumps up and tackles Batman, sending them both off the edge of the pavilion. That’s odd behaviour that is not explained. Once no one can see them, Bruce switches to Batman and Alfred dons a Bruce Wayne mask. When Batman and “Bruce” return to the pavilion Robin is alone and Riddler and Penguin have escaped. Robin says Penguin said something about corralling the old Ulysses caper. Since Ulysses was the general who created the Trojan Horse, Batman concludes this party was a decoy so Riddler and Penguin could go after the Trojan Horse replica. Gordon arrives and urges them to stop the crooks or he’ll lose his pension. At the museum the guards are gassed to sleep and the Trojan Horse is clamped from a skylight and raised up by flying umbrella. But Batman has planted a homing transmitter in the horse and so they follow in the Batmobile. In a mountainous region the heroes attack. There is a short fight and Riddler is captured. Penguin flies away but from the Batmobile Robin fires a baterang by batapult that wraps up Penguin and pulls him down. 

            In the second story the circus comes to Gotham. There is a parade but the clown car is driven by Joker. Suddenly his men release the lions, tigers and elephants to terrorize the public. There is a National Guard tank in the parade. Penguin gasses the driver and takes control. Batman and Robin arrive and Batman says they have to take control of the leader of each group of animals. I don’t think that would really work with lions and tigers because they are not herd animals. But Batman uses a chair and a whip and gets the lions back into their cage. Robin rides the lead elephant and the rest fall in. Penguin’s tank is being followed by two circus penguins. Penguin and Joker use the tank to rob banks. Batman borrows a baby penguin from the circus to track the other two penguins that he knows followed Penguin. The penguin leads the heroes to the cave hideout. The tank comes out to confront the Batmobile and shoots a smoke bomb. The tank pushes the Batmobile over a cliff but the heroes activate a parachute to slow their descent. Batman climbs back up and stands before the tank. It rolls over him but he lies between the tracks. Batman climbs on the tank from behind and drops in a gas capsule. The villains have to leave the tank and they are captured. 

            Some of the backgrounds for these episodes were done by Venetia Epler, who sold her first painting on the street in Paris at the age of 7. She studied painting at Slades in London and stained glass at the London School of Arts and Crafts and the École de Louvre in Paris. She became a scenic artist for MGM. She did backgrounds on The Archie Show, Aquaman, and Charlotte’s Web. She illustrated the book Angels of the Bible. In 1972 she and her sister created a Life of Christ mosaic at the Christian Heritage Mausoleum in Covina Hills, California that is the western hemisphere’s largest religious mosaic. Her specialties were stained glass and ceramics. She and Daphne created windows for churches in California and England. She started a novelty company with her brother Richard creating hand painted jewellery and curios. But California banned the use of kilns on residential property and she had to turn to painting. Her portrait of Eisenhower hung in Nixon’s White House and is now in the Nixon Library.

March 27, 1995: I posed at the Ontario College of Art

Thirty years ago today

            On Monday I posed at the Ontario College of Art.

Mel Keefer

            On Tuesday morning I reworked my translation of the second and most of the third verse of “Le petit Lauriston” by Boris Vian. 

            I continued working out the chords for the last verse of “Sacha Distel et Jean-Pierre Cassel’s Song and Dance” by Serge Gainsbourg but got stuck when I saw that Cy Strom’s transcription of the French for the second line was not entirely accurate. He said it was “Que voulez-vous honte de ne pas être naturel” but I’m pretty sure the word “naturel” is not being sung. It sounds more like “y eut a celles” but I don’t know if that’s grammatically correct. I’ll go with that though and hope that someone corrects me if I’m wrong. But people aren’t like me. If I know something’s wrong online and there’s an opportunity to comment, I’ll offer a correction. I’m sure I’ve gotten lots wrong in my posts but nobody ever corrects me. 

            I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice for the last of four sessions. Tomorrow I’ll begin a two session stretch of playing my electric guitars. 

            I weighed 86.6 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I cleaned the older warm mist humidifier. It took a little longer than usual because I only had three cups of vinegar, which is not enough to fully soak the heating unit while it’s still in the tank. I had to soak it separately with the same vinegar in a salad bowl later. Maybe I won’t have to clean it again until fall but I probably will. 

            I got caught up on my journal. 

            I weighed 86.75 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride and stopped at Freshco on my way back. I needed shaving gel, toilet paper, 2 in 1 shampoo, and Garden Cocktail, but since I was there I thought I’d buy some grapes since they’re on sale. But the green grapes are even cheaper at Longos and I tried to access the flyer on my phone but couldn’t get there. Longos kept asking for my postal code but the key pad wouldn’t come up. Finally I just got five bags of green grapes at their price and a pack of raspberries, plus the other stuff I’d come for. I asked Priscilla if they price match Longos but she said they don’t so I wasted my time trying to find the flyer. I found it later in case I use it at No Frills some time. 

            I think I’ve got my bike saddle at the right height now or pretty close. 

            I weighed 85.6 kilos at 18:39, which is the lightest I’ve been in the evening since February 9. 

            I was caught up in my journal at 19:42. 

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the studio recording of my song “Seven Shades of Blues” I edited some more of Wings of Desire. I kept the dream sequence with the angel and the trapeze artist. I deleted everything up until the now former angel meets the ex-angel Peter Falk. At this point Movie Maker froze and wouldn’t function no matter how many times it restarted. This happened a few years ago and weeks went by before one particular project unfroze. I made it work just now as a test. There are only 36 minutes left so hopefully tomorrow I can finish Wings of Desire. That’s the only part of the project that’s been freezing. 

            I was making my supper salad and realized that I forgot to buy lemons and so I went over to Queen Fresh where I bought three lemons and three limes for $5. I’d always thought that business was only run by two women but there were two men there helping to close up. One of the women came from the back to handle my transaction. 

            I had a tomato, avocado, cucumber, and scallion salad with lime juice and a glass of Garden Cocktail while watching episodes 13 and 14 of The Adventures of Batman. 

            In the first story, the Joker robs the city treasury and plants some of the money in the mayor’s safe, some in the district attorney’s desk, and the basement of the chief magistrate. Then Joker calls a press conference to accuse those three officials of corruption. The police find the money and confirm that the Joker is right. Joker also announces that he is running for mayor and that Professor Ludendorff is going to help him. Batman explains to Robin that Ludendorff is the most brilliant scientist in the world. Batman and Robin go to Ludendorff’s lab where the Joker has just taken the professor’s invention for rigging voting machines. They try to stop him but two of Joker’s men attack. It only takes two baterang throws to put the thugs out of commission. Then Joker shoots argon electrical gas at the heroes but they manage to get themselves and the professor out of the way before it explodes. Later in the warehouse where the voting machines are stored, Joker’s men are planting hacking devices on every one. Batman and Robin confront them but they are trapped inside a voting booth. The Joker wins the election. Batman and Robin are facing each other while tied to beams in the warehouse. They put their feet together and push, causing the beams to break. They go to the mayor’s office to confront Joker. He orders Batman and Robin arrested and says the new district attorney is Riddler and the new chief magistrate is Penguin. Commissioner Gordon and Chief O’Hara refuse to cooperate and so they are arrested with Batman and Robin and sentenced to thirty days. When Alfred hears of this he flies the Bat Copter above the jail and lowers a hook, which Batman attaches to the bars. The helicopter is somehow able to pull the window out of the wall and Batman and Robin escape up a ladder to the chopper. Since Joker took their utility belts he’s inadvertently bugged himself and now Batman and Robin can listen in on his conversations. They hear that Joker, Penguin and Riddler will be visiting the city treasury that night. When Batman and Robin try to stop them from taking the money they are surrounded by police. They escape with their bat ropes. Then the Penguin goes to the prison with an order to release all the convicts and have them report to his office. He gives each one a jet umbrella and tells them to use them to rob the city and bring the loot to him. When Joker returns to his office he sees Penguin and Riddler gone and when he looks out the window and sees all the flying umbrellas he realizes that his partners have gone into business for themselves. Batman and Robin see the flying umbrella’s too and follow them back to the Penguin’s nest. They nab him but then Joker arrives with the cops to arrest all three of them. Batman and Robin escape. Riddler in his capacity as district attorney acquires secret plans of the defense plant. He is driving away when he sees the Batmobile and it causes him to crash into a tree. Joker captures Professor Ludendorff and ties him to the back of a target at the shooting range. Batman and Robin confront Joker but he knocks them out with gas capsules and they are also tied to the back of targets. Joker calls Gordon and O’Hara to tell them they need shooting practice. They are about to shoot when Batman kicks a lever that turns the targets around. Batman tells them that the professor can prove Joker rigged the voting machines. The Joker is giving his victory speech when Batman and Robin arrive at the theatre. He sees them and tries to run but baterangs knock sandbags on top of him. 

            In the second story a Viking ship encased in ice is seen in Gotham Harbour. There appear to be real Vikings frozen inside. But beneath the ship is a submarine captained by Mr. Freeze. Freeze has his men melt the ice and free the Vikings. They all climb into Freeze’s ice cream truck and are driven to his ice factory hideout. His plan is for them to plunder Gotham and because scholars think they are real Vikings they won’t want them attacked. They rob a bank and a scholar won’t let the cops shoot. Then the Vikings raid a department store. Batman and Robin arrive and beat them. The anthropologist escapes with the Vikings to protect them. Batman and Robin confront them again outside the building. When the professor hears one of the Vikings calls Batman and Robin “caped creeps” he realizes they aren’t Vikings after all. Freeze escapes with his thugs and freezes the Batmobile. Batman and Robin follow in the Bat Copter to the harbour where Freeze is sailing on the Viking ship. Batman and Robin lower themselves onto the ship and fight Freeze’s men. Freeze escapes below to his submarine but Robin follows to be immediately frozen in Freeze’s ultra cold environment. Batman throws a pole into the water that damages the engine of Freeze’s submarine and causes it to heat up. Freeze could die without 50 below temperatures and so Robin uses Freeze’s gun to put him on ice. 

            Some of the layouts for these episodes were done by Mel Keefer, who trained as an illustrator at the San Diego School of Art. His first job was drawing the Perry Mason newspaper strip. In 1955 he co-created the golf themed Mac Divot comic strip and it ran for twenty years. He also drew the strips Thorne McBride, Rick O’Shay, Dragnet and Gene Autry. He did the artwork for the film How To Murder Your Wife. He did layouts for 58 episodes of Sabrina the Teenage Witch. He drew the Zorro comic for Dell and Gold Key after Alex Toth quit.

March 26, 1995: I posed at the Toronto School of Art

Thirty years ago today

             On Sunday I posed all day for the open drawing session at the Toronto School of Art.

Marilee Heyer

            On Monday morning I ran through singing and playing “Le petit Lauriston” by Boris Vian in French. I started working on revising my translation and got the first verse but I’m a little stuck on the refrain “O gué” and how it relates to this comical lampooning of the French Gestapo. “Gué” is a ford or crossing but it also related to keeping watch, so I’m assuming the latter meaning is more relevant here. 

            I started working out the chords for the last verse of “Sacha Distel et Jean-Pierre Cassel’s Song and Dance” by Serge Gainsbourg. But I noticed I had the wrong word and so I had to figure out the right one. I had “quelque chose”, meaning “some thing” but it turns out it’s “quelque peu”, meaning “somewhat”. I should have the last verse worked out tomorrow and maybe the final scat parts as well. 

            I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice for the third session of four. 

            I weighed 86.7 kilos before breakfast. 

            After shaving and showering myself and then doing the dishes there wasn’t enough time to do any hole filling in the bathroom. But there was time to edit some of season 3, episode 3 of Batman to show only the appearances of Batgirl. 

            I weighed 87.05 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I headed out for a bike ride but stopped into Metro Cycle to get my saddle raised a touch. It might still be a little too low but I’ll compare it with the Raleigh tomorrow to double check. I should just get a torque wrench for Allen keys. I rode downtown and back. 

            I weighed 86.3 kilos at 18:00. 

            I was caught up in my journal at 18:55.

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the studio recording of my song “Seven Shades of Blues” I continued editing my copy of Wings of Desire. From the last appearance of the costume angel wings through the first Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds concert I deleted everything. I was up to the trapeze artist’s dream of the angel when I quit for the night. There are 51 minutes left. 

            I reviewed the song practice videos of my acoustic performances of “Sixteen Tons of Dogma” from October 11 to 13. On October 11 the take at 20:30 was great until the E flat chord at the end. On October 12 somehow part A of that day’s video is corrupted even though I viewed it before. On October 13 the take at 30:45 was okay. 

            I had a tomato, avocado, cucumber, and scallion salad with lemon juice and a glass of Garden Cocktail while watching episodes 11 and 12 of The Adventures of Batman. 

            Batman and Robin are being honoured with statues in Gotham Square. Suddenly it’s raining toy umbrellas and Penguin descends in an upside down bumbershoot. His umbrella hovers above the statues and robot arms clamp them as they are lifted from their platforms to be carried away. But Batman and Robin arrive and Batapult themselves into Penguin’s umbrella. Suddenly the Jokerplane arrives and knocks them all from the umbrella but catches Penguin to help him escape to their hideout in an abandoned carnival. It turns out that the Riddler is part of their gang and the trio is engaged in a competition. Whoever pulls off the most daring crime takes over the crime empire of Gotham. Joker spins a wheel and the Riddler gets the next chance. He sends a riddle to Batman via Commissioner Gordon: “What is found beneath the ground that rhymes with malt and salt?”. Robin concludes Riddler is after the storage vaults of Gotham Labs. So that night at the Gotham Vaults the guards are confronted by several replicas of the Riddler. Since they don’t stop when ordered the guards shoot but it turns out the Riddlers are balloons full of sleeping gas. Meanwhile Barbara Gordon figures out the riddle and changes to Batgirl to head for the vaults as well. Riddler is at the vaults about to steal the plutonium when he is confronted by Batman and Robin. Riddler’s men attack and the fight takes place (Neither the heroes or villains are wearing any protection from radioactivity). A Baterang hits a steam shovel and causes it to drop its load of plutonium on top of the Riddler’s thugs. The Riddler runs away and Batman is about to hit him with a baterang when the light from Batgirl’s arriving motorcycle blinds him and Riddler gets away. Batman is more forgiving than Robin. Now it’s Joker’s turn and he takes it when Gotham Bank has just filled an armoured car. Joker has a giant magnet on the back of the Jokermobile with Penguin and Riddler as his passengers. He backs into the armoured car and drives away with it. The Batmobile is in pursuit and the Joker can’t go very fast with the load he’s towing but he says he wants Batman to catch up. He crosses a bascule bridge and then pushes a button to cause it to rise just as the Batmobile is crossing. The Batmobile falls but Batman uses its hover jets for a soft landing. Seeing Batman back behind him, the Joker releases the armoured car. Then he gets a surprise message from a helicopter above guiding him to a secret entrance inside of a mountain that seals after them. Inside the villains are greeted by Catwoman who proposes the four of them work together to control Gotham. Her plan is to systematically immobilize the Gotham police. Batman and Robin have lost their trail and have to give up for now. But later Batman gets a tip that Penguin is planning to wreck the police communication centre. Penguin uses an electrical ray to destroy the police switchboard and then he is confronted by Batman, Robin and then Batgirl. Penguin tries to run but Batgirl grabs him by his coattails and he is arrested. Then they get a tip that Riddler plans to foul police transportation. An all points bulletin directs all cars to a particular corner where Riddler activates a maze that traps all the police cars. Batman uses the battering ram on the Batmobile to break through the walls of the maze. Then the ram hits the building where Riddler is standing on the roof and knocks him down into Batgirl’s sidecar, which she never had before. Meanwhile at the entrance to the Gotham Police Arsenal the guards see a miniature Joker windup toy approaching. They think it’s a time bomb and scatter but the toy only holds up a sign that says “Boom!” The Joker’s men roll trucks into the arsenal to steal all the weapons but Batman and Robin got a tip that this was his plan and so they are already there. The fight erupts and the heroes win easily. The Joker tries to get away but Batgirl slaps bat cuffs on him. The three captured villains say Catwoman betrayed them. Batman and Robin take the Bat plane and out in the country see a clearing in the woods shaped like a cat’s head. They descend from Bat ropes but immediately fall into a camouflaged tiger trap where they are suspended above the jaws of a giant robot tiger. Batman and Robin melt the tiger’s teeth with Bat torches. Catwoman tries to escape but she is wound up with a batrope baterang.

            In the second story, instead of a robbing the bank the crooks leave a sack of silver dollars. Batman and Robin hear of a burglary at a jewellery store and they rush there but find diamonds strewn on the floor with a note that reads: “Bringing ice to a jeweller is a strange kind of crime, keep your eye on the birdie and we’ll see you next time”. They conclude the message is from the Riddler and that a birdie refers to a picture and so they head for the museum. Riddler instals homing devices and exits without stealing anything but is cornered by Batman. Suddenly Catwoman jumps out and sprays freezing gas that causes the heroes to slip on ice. When they recover their balance the Riddler and Catwoman are gone. They go back to the museum where a golden statue that was stolen last year has been returned with another riddle: “If you’re still blind as a bat the next time around, the Riddler and his girl will be the richest in town”. Batman concludes that Riddler plans to rob the same three places again. Meanwhile Catwoman and Riddler are riding through a sewer tunnel in a rocket powered sled. Then Riddler bores up into the Gotham bank using his atomic tunnel digger following the homing device he left in the bank. He successfully robs the bank but plants clues to lure Batman to his and Catwoman’s hideout. He causes the clocks to stop at 9 to 4:00. Batman picks up the clue and reverses it to 49ers and figures out that they are using the sewers but I don’t get it. Batman and Robin go to the tunnel under the museum and watch as Catwoman and Riddler emerge with the treasures. They follow the crooks but are detected and a trap is sprung. Two walls come down and water begins gushing in. They use the underwater bat torch to cut through. They chase the villains again. Batman and Robin are then caught in a giant metal spider’s web. Catwoman says that the web is hooked to a power line and she goes to turn on the switch to electrocute them. But Batman uses an acid capsule to cut the power line. Next Catwoman and Riddler bore up into the bullion vault at the trade centre. While they are getting the gold Batman and Robin hide under their rocket sled and so they are transported to the villains’ hideout. Their thugs attack the heroes while the Riddler and Catwoman use the tunneller to escape. But Batman has hacked the homing device causing them to tunnel into prison. 

            Some of the layouts for these episodes were done by Marilee Heyer, who earned her BA at the Art Centre College of Design in LA and then studied at the San Francisco Institute of Art. Her first job was doing layouts for the Lone Ranger animated series. She also worked on The Adventures of Batman, Journey to the Centre of the Earth, The Hardy Boys, and The Archies. She became a fashion artist for department stores and newspapers. After seeing the first Star Wars movie she was inspired to put together a portfolio of science fiction themed drawings in hopes of working for Lucasfilm. In 1981 she was hired to work on storyboards and to do portraits of Carrie Fisher in various hairstyles for the upcoming Return of the Jedi. She was the only woman in the art department. Her first illustrated book was The Weaving of A Dream” based on a Chinese folk tale. Then she wrote and illustrated The Forbidden Door. She did posters for the LA Opera. Star Wars has credited her for some of her work but they have published some of it in books without credit. She continues to struggle with that.

March 25, 1995: I spent several hours with my daughter

Thirty years ago today 

             On Saturday I have no record of what I did but chances are I saw my daughter for several hours although she still didn’t want to stay overnight